A New Rose
by caputdraconis14
Summary: Rose and Scorpius both have some explaining to do. A heated hatred for each other turns into a little bit more- but neither of them know quite what that is and whether or not to be happy about it. When their families find out, everything changes.
1. Grace, Dignity and Diplomacy

_**Hello! Welcome to my newest fanfiction! If any of you have read my other Rose/Scorp fic, I will say that this is similar, but better (And I"m not saying that to be cocky, but because it's not hard to be better than that). First off, disclaimer, I don't own the characters, of course! Also, this is rated M for a reason. I hope you enjoy!**_

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><p><strong>Chapter 1<strong>

**Grace, Dignity and Diplomacy**

_Attention People of Hogwarts, Weasley Family, Potter Family, and anyone else that might be concerned:_

_I, Rose Nymphadora Weasley would like to make several things very clear. Please read my following words very carefully. I promise you, they will explain everything!_

_But before I begin, let me tell you, I did not ask for this. Some people seem to think that I did, which is a joke, and it's starting to make me angry. So, in order to clarify any uncertainties and squash any false rumors, I am writing this letter and sharing it with the world._

_I DID NOT kiss Scorpius Malfoy. Intentionally._

_I DID NOT spend unfathomable amounts of time in his bed. Intentionally._

_I DID, however, break his nose with my own fist (subsequently breaking a knuckle). Intentionally._

_Please read on if you are still confused. Thank you._

-CD-

_Look, all you dumb bastards (Particularly those of the Weasley and Potter clan):_

_I don't care what your Weasley cousin/sister/offspring, says, she wanted everything just as much as I did. Believe me. She wanted every minute of it. And she enjoyed it too. And when she punched me in the face, I don't actually think I deserved it, and it serves her right for breaking that knuckle of hers. She's circulating some letter now, and I'm sure is filled with falsities she is employing in order to save her skin from the patronizing looks she's probably going to get. So I'm creating my own little rebuttal, filled with the truth. Because sometimes the truth hurts._

_If you bother to read on with hers, you might want to read on with mine. Signed, yours truly, Scorpius H. Malfoy._

-CD-

Chapter 1:

Rose:

"He's staring at you again," Albus whispered, nudging me with his elbow. I looked up from my oatmeal and _Daily Prophet. _

"What?" I scanned the Great Hall, confused. I had no idea who he was talking about.

"Malfoy," Albus said. "He's _staring _at you. Again."

"No he's not," I said, rolling my eyes. I glanced carelessly over at the Slytherin table. Malfoy's eyes were certainly trained in this direction, but it could be at any girl at the Gryffindor table. Merlin. Albus was getting worked up about nothing.

"Yeah, he is," Albus said, shooting a glare in the Slytherin direction.

"Shut up," I said, turning the page in my _Prophet. _

"I'm just saying," Albus said. "It's getting creepy."

"Albus, you're making stuff up," I said. "You're just trying to make him creepy because he's a Malfoy."

"Well, what can I say? It's in their blood," Albus said, shaking sugar over his cornflakes.

"Hey, Rose, why's Malfoy staring at you?" Lily demanded, plopping down on the bench across from Albus and me.

"He's _not _staring at me," I insisted, focusing on the articles at hand.

"If you insist…" Lily said, shrugging. "Looks like he's staring to me." She glanced over her shoulder. "Oh. Never mind. He's focusing more on the Ravenclaw Chaser—Edwards?"

"Yeah, that's her name," Albus said.

"He's such a pig," I commented, shaking my head exasperatedly. "Why does he have to be a smart pig?"

"Rose, Mum knew this was going to happen," Hugo commented, sitting down next to Lily. "You're talking about Malfoy, right? Yeah. Mum knew you two could never be friends… Too much educational competition."

"Dad encourages it," I said. I sucked absentmindedly on my oatmeal spoon, reading about a Holyhead Harpies match, where they played the Kenmare Kestrels. Aunt Ginny wrote a damn good article.

"All the more reason not to go for it," Lily teased. "Ah, Uncle Ron."

"We've made it this far without too many duels," I said. "We'll see. Seventh year ought to be the charm. Maybe I'll beat him this time." I folded up my paper and shoved away my breakfast, standing up.

"Where are you going?" Albus said. "You haven't even gotten your schedule!"

"Shush. The Head Girl doesn't need her schedule," I said, blushing, because he'd hit the nail on the head.

"Right… " Albus said. "Well… to each her own, I suppose."

"Look… I'm going to attempt to not kill him," I said. "Malfoy is Head Boy, I'm Head Girl… we have to at least _sort of _be friends. Or at least sort of get along."

"Don't look now, Malfoy's getting up too," Albus said.

"Shut up, Albus!" I shouted, heading in the direction of the staff table to get my schedule from Professor Longbottom.

Malfoy and I were rivals. We had never really spoken to each other, save for a few verbal arguments, and at least one or two (or fourteen) violent duels in the hallway. But those usually had very few words. We weren't friends, and our families didn't want us to be. My parents didn't like him, and my family didn't like his family. And the same went in the other direction.

But there was no denying he was smart. He was. And he was talented, and he was a kind enough person to most people, most of the time. He had overcome a bit, I supposed, getting over the whole "Death Eater's son" thing pretty well. For the most part. He broke down a few stereotypes, reinforced a few others, and managed to remain neck and neck with me for the entirety of our Hogwarts careers.

"There you are, Rose," Professor Longbottom said kindly to me. "I suppose you would like your schedule?"

"Yes, I would, thank you," I said, smiling brightly.

"All set for the school year?" he asked.

"Of course," I said. "Never been unprepared for anything in my entire life."

"I don't doubt it," Professor Longbottom said. "Well, I should see you for the third class of the day, if I'm not mistaken."

I glanced at the schedule. "You're not."

"Good," he said. "Good luck with your head girl duties."

"Thank you," I said, glancing to the side at Scorpius Malfoy, who had approached the staff table too, and was receiving his schedule from Professor Baldock, the Charms teacher and Head of Slytherin House. "I'm going to need it."

Professor Longbottom followed my gaze and chuckled to himself. "What, are you referring to your newly instated partnership with Mr. Malfoy?"

Malfoy glanced up at us and grinned a wicked grin in my direction.

"That's exactly what I'm referring to," I said, putting dramatic hand on my forehead. "Excuse me, Professor, I must go practice my jinxes…"

"Rose…" Professor Longbottom cautioned. But he couldn't help but laugh. It was almost as if he was encouraging me to magically castrate Scorpius Malfoy…

"Rose, Rose, Rose, Rose!" the screeched echoed behind me. My best friends, Anna Robins and Colleen Ryan bolted out of the Hall after me.

"What?" I said, turning around in shock. Last I'd seen them, they were both still sound asleep in our dorm room. "Did you two even eat?"

"Yeah…" Anna said. "Only, Albus just told us that Malfoy was ogling you again."

"Albus is a big mouth know-it-all," I informed them, crossing my arms bitterly. "He's being a drama queen too. You two should actually eat something instead of eating gossip."

"Eh, I don't really care a piece of toast is good with me," Colleen said, grinning. "Where are you going?"

"I was going to go to the library," I said.

"Of course you were," Anna said, rolling her eyes. She and Colleen sighed in unison. We were a remarkable trio, and we had been since the beginning of our first year. Three of the five Gryffindor girls that came from that year, and we got along swimmingly from the first moment. But we were three very different people. I was the brain of the bunch, devoted to my studies, Quidditch, and my future. Anna was more concerned with the various boys she could lure into her clutches, and Colleen was interested in most things that other people weren't interested in.

"No you aren't," a cold, drawl echoed behind us.

"Merlin, he legitimately has the sexiest voice," Anna whispered as I turned around. Malfoy stood behind us, having followed them out of the hall.

"More like grating and pretentious," I disagreed. "What do you want, Malfoy?"

"I don't want anything," Malfoy said. "Professor Bones says she would like to see both of us in her office before class."

"Oh," I said. As much as I didn't want to listen to Malfoy or go _anywhere _with him, I couldn't exactly say no to our headmistress.

-CD-

Scorpius:

There were three things about Hogwarts that I could say I easily and strongly disliked. The first was the school's version of Yorkshire Pudding. The second was the fact that we could still get in trouble for wandering around the school after hours if we were prefects. The last and perhaps the most grating, was the entire Weasley family (and that included Albus, Lily and James Potter). If I had to narrow down that Weasley deal though, I would certainly pick Rose Weasley as the chief offender and most irritating.

She walked haughtily off in the direction of Professor Bone's office, with her nose angled more toward the ceiling than anywhere else and one hand on her hip. I followed her grudgingly, stalking after her. My long strides quickly over took her shorter ones—even though she was abnormally and awkwardly tall for a girl, I was still taller.

When I got my letter from Hogwarts this summer, it had the Head Boy pin inside of it, with a letter detailing all of the duties and catches that came with the badge. I knew right away that if I got the honor, so did Rose Weasley. There was no other candidate. I almost wished I hadn't gotten it, so long as she hadn't gotten it either.

It wasn't fair.

I just once wanted something that she didn't get too.

She gave me a snooty glance as I walked past her and she crossed her arms over her chest. She had a look that could literally kill. If I had been anyone else, I probably would've cringed. But over the years, I'd developed a thick-skinned immunity do the death glares of Rose Weasley. I just returned them with my bitter indignation and we dwelled in mutual hatred.

It was a satisfactory way to be. I had survived so far. Now that I was forced to actually work with Weasley, I was probably going to have to adjust a little bit, but I could handle it. I would be mature if she would be mature—which meant that neither of us would end up mature, truth be told.

She spat the password to Professor Bones' office and the gargoyle leapt aside. Rose stepped on the staircase first, and I stepped on after her. She was humming to herself—some annoying tune, probably from the Weird Sisters. I tried to ignore it, but it wandered around my head, twisting around my brain cells like some sort of toxic poison.

She pushed through the door and I followed, greeting our headmistress together.

"Please sit," Our young headmistress said kindly, gesturing to the chairs. Weasley and I both sat in silence. Professor Bones assessed us for a moment. "Good morning to both of you."

"Good morning," Rose replied kindly. She used her teacher voice—the voice with which she addressed all authority figures. It was less snotty than the other voice, which she used to boss people around and cuss at me.

"So…" Professor Bones said. "Congratulations to both of you. You both truly deserve the titles I have bestowed on you."

"Thank you," I said, using my own teacher voice. It was less pretentious than my other voice.

"I know you aren't the best of friends," Professor Bones said, shaking her head. "But I know you two can handle these roles with grace, dignity, and diplomacy."

She let her glance linger on both of us separately to emphasize her words. Her eyes clearly told both of us not to instigate anything.

"Of course we will," Rose said.

"Of course," I seconded.

Of course.


	2. Poor, Innocent Fly

_**A/N: Just an FYI, I try to update more quickly than this. I was just out of the range of non-sketchy internet. Long story. Anyway, I update about as fast as I write (tends to be anywhere from between 2 days apart to 10 days apart on a bad week or something). **_

**Chapter 2:**

**Poor, Innocent Fly**

Rose:

"This should be illegal," I grumbled under my breath.

"It's just Charms," Albus said, waving his wand haphazardly.

"No, it's not just Charms," I said. "It's Charms resulting in bruises."

"It only results in bruises for the people that can't actually cast a silent spell," Albus said.

"It's only a problem when you cast the _wrong _silent spell," I muttered loudly, casting the correct one now.

"I will admit, it was pretty funny to see that book fly up and hit you in the nose," Albus said, shrugging.

"Shush. Everyone saw. Shut up," I said, blush creeping into my cheeks. Of course. That traitorous characteristic of every poor redhead.

"Never," Albus said. "It's my job to mock you, as your cousin and best friend."

"Ugh," I said. "I can do it perfectly!" I looked around at the classroom. No one cared anymore. They had, of course, all been watching when I did it wrong. Now that I could do it right, they all decided I was showing off. I got along well with pretty much everyone in Gryffindor, Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff, though many of the Ravenclaws were bitter when I eclipsed their mental prowess with my own. The Slytherins were, however, the major exception. They were forever on the Malfoy side of things. They would follow him off a bridge and straight through the gates of Hell, if he so chose to lead him in that way. They followed his lead in not liking me very much. Not at all, actually.

But it was okay, because I had the Gryffindors (and most of the Hufflepuffs and Ravenclaws on a good day).

"Is your nose okay?" Anna asked, tapping her on the shoulder. She and Colleen were sitting behind Albus and me.

"Yeah," I snapped, rubbing my nose. Even Professor Baldock had laughed at me. Which was really unfair, because I was still the best at silent spells in that class. I had done it first when everyone was just starting to learn. Sure, Malfoy was second, but whatever. I could block that out if I tried.

He was chortling in the next row of desks, his Slytherin posse shaking with amusement. I wasn't sure if it was from the joy of seeing me hit myself in the face with a book, or from some other riveting, titillating comment made by their revered leader. He was just waving his wand around carelessly, executing perfectly the task Professor Baldock had set for us.

"Now you're staring at him…" Albus whispered.

"I'm just grumpy," I snapped in defense, crossing my arms.

"I know you don't like him, Rosie," Albus said, laughing. "But you should get over it. You have to deal with him."

"You don't like him either," I argued.

"I don't, you're right," Albus said, shaking his head. "He's a cocky arse. But…"

"But you don't have to deal with him. I do," I said.

"Yeah, but I _do _have to Seek against him," Albus said, crossing his arms.

"Yeah, yeah," I said, shaking my head. "Which means you're allowed to dislike him, I'm sure."

"Pretty much," Albus said.

"It's also in our blood to dislike him," I said. "We shouldn't go against blood…."

"Yeah, Merlin forbid we do that," Albus said, glancing over at Malfoy.

Albus' best mates, Andrew and Will, turned around in their seats to look at him and strike up some sort of conversation. I grumbled under my breath a little. My seventh year was just off to the most charming start.

I had far too many plans to let Scorpius Malfoy ruin it for me, though. I dug into my bag, extracting a brand new notebook. I dipped my quill in the ink and made a large heading at the top of the first page.

Rose Weasley's Goals for her 7th Year at Hogwarts

Beat Scorpius Malfoy on the N.E.

Win the Quidditch Cup for Gryffindor

Get into the Auror Training Program at the Ministry

Become better at Potions…

Perhaps find a boyfriend if time allows

Discover an irreversible Silencing Charm and put it on Malfoy

I had a goal list for every year of Hogwarts. I usually added to it or crossed things off, but by the end, everything that I decided had to be accomplished was accomplished. For this year, that would be, so far, items one through four. Not that six wouldn't be ideal, and not that five wouldn't be nice… It was just… there were more important things at hand.

"Miss Weasley, what are you doing?" Professor Baldock asked.

"I'm done with the Charm work," I said.

"Everyone can always use more practice," she said, shaking her head and walking away. I was fairly certain she didn't like me either, but grudgingly gave me good marks because she knew I deserved them. Malfoy had her wrapped around his long, bony fingers too. It was like admittance to the Slytherin house required worship of him. Which was weird, because at the beginning of our first year, that was certainly not the case. Even Slytherins didn't like Malfoy at the beginning.

No one wanted to be friends with the Death Eater's son, cold as that sounded. Even the people of his own house were worried that he would give them a bad name, and they were sick of the stereotypes of evil that came out of that place. I knew from my own experience that the majority of Slytherins were good people, even if they didn't like me much. But they didn't want a Malfoy tarnishing their recovered reputation. It took a little while for them to warm up to him. I don't know how he did it, but he convinced them that he was some great bloke. I suppose he probably was a terribly loyal friend, but they were certainly enamored enough with him by the end of first year—even the older kids, at that.

I glanced over at him. He was leaning back in his chair, half asleep. And Professor Baldock wasn't telling him to practice more.

Then again, he hadn't hit himself in the face with a book today.

-CD-

Scorpius:

"Just _look _at her…" my best friend Emmett whispered to me, leaning in at the dinner table.

"Who am I looking at?" I asked, looking up from my Defense book.

"Emilia Lawrence," he said, as if the name actually tasted good in his mouth.

I looked toward the other end of the Slytherin table. Emilia was in our year, and she had never really looked twice at Emmett before. She liked older men… but I supposed there were no longer any of those around, seeing as we were as old as it got.

"Yeah? What am I supposed to be seeing?" I asked. Most of Emilia's life was spent bending over things and hemming her skirt with magic.

"How hot she is," Emmett said, as if I was oblivious. Emmett was my American friend. He had moved from America to Britain when his Muggle father got a job in politics. His mother was a witch, and had gone to an American school.

"Oh… yeah, she's pretty attractive," I said, looking back at my book and scooping some more mashed potatoes into my mouth.

"Don't sound so enthused. I would think you were straight," Emmett said, annoyed. He didn't get it. I was immune to most of the female population, save for whatever girl I was fixated on from time to time. I'd slept with several—they found me hard to resist once they figured out I liked them. I also made the mistake of once sleeping with my best girl friend, Andi. We couldn't look each other in the face for a week after that. But I couldn't be attracted to someone so obviously skanky, like Emilia.

"I'm not interested in her," I declared.

"Good, I want her," Emmet said.

"Good for you," I said.

"So what poor girl is the object of your affection now?" Emmett wondered. "Unwitting as she is?"

"No one," I said, trying to keep myself from glancing over at the Gryffindor table.

"Oh Merlin no!" Emmet said, following my gaze. He gripped the top of my arm. "Please tell me it isn't true?"

"What?" I said. "What are you going on about?"

"Weasley…" he said. "Please tell me it's not Weasley…"

"No!" I said. "No of course not. Merlin, don't have a heart attack on me, Emmett. In what world would I ever be interested in Rose Weasley?"

"I don't know," Emmett said. "What other Gryffindor might you be interested in? She's the only one that came to mind…"

"Never in a million years," I said. "She would rip my balls off and carry them around in her bag. I don't need that kind of stress or torture. Besides, she's freakishly tall."

"You're still taller than she is," he pointed out.

"I know, I know," I said, "but that doesn't fix it."

"Well she is kind of pretty…" he said.

"If you like red hair," I said.

"I get it, I get it, you're not interested in her," he said.

"No, I'm not," I said. "She's far too annoying. She'd probably talk in bed."

Emmet snorted. "Yeah, probably."

Andi—short for Andrea—dropped into the seat next to me, reaching for some food. "Hey."

"Hey," I said. "Why are you late?"

"I got caught up in Care of Magical Creatures," she said, holding up an arm. It was wrapped in several white bandages and some sort of yellow liquid was seeping out at the seams.

"That's repulsive," Emmett said. "Put that away while we're eating."

"Some sort of fanged beast latched onto me while I was feeding it. I think it thought my arm was a toy. I just spent the last hour in the hospital wing while Madam Longley treated it. She couldn't quite figure out what was wrong with it and why it wouldn't stop bleeding."

"I'm _eating," _Emmett said.

"Stop being such a girl," she snapped at him, loading roast beef onto her plate. She yawned resting her wounded arm in her lap.

"We were just discussing who Scorpius might be interested in this fine school year," Emmet declared, leaning around me to talk to Andi.

"Splendid," she said. "Who is the poor innocent fly Scorpius is going to trap in his big web of masculinity?"

I glared at her. "Shut up."

"I'm just saying," she said. "You're a fairly determined predator who refuses to be deterred—no matter the cost to the sanity of his friends."

"It's some Gryffindor," Emmet said. "He won't elaborate."

"I'll bet it's Anna Robins," she said, shrugging. "It's the only one that makes sense. She's the only moderately pretty one over there."

"Yeah…" I said. "Not quite."

I wasn't going to tell them. Since our mistake of fucking each other, Andi had a habit of warning the girls I liked ahead of time if I was interested in them. It never had the effect she desired—usually it involved them just becoming more interested in me. She wasn't warning them that I was bad in bed—even she wouldn't say that. But just that I would basically sleep with anything, including my best friend. I didn't need her messing around with my relationships. Which meant I couldn't tell Emmet either, because he got a kick out of things when they didn't go my way, which meant he was very happy to tell Andi all of my secrets.

"Then it must be the little Potter?" Andi said loudly. "You like Lily?"

"Shut up!" I barked. I didn't need her shouting that all over the place. Not only was that completely false, but also… I didn't need Albus Potter thinking I was horny for his fifteen-year-old sister. That screamed pedophile, and if I knew the Potter boys they would probably figure out a way to kill me or make it impossible for me to ever have sex without excruciating pain. Something like that. I was afraid of the two of them, as a pair, and what they could do to me… Albus I could handle alone. James and Albus was a nightmare.

Andi laughed cruelly. "She's the only other pretty Gryffindor."

I shrugged. "Fine. Says you."

"You're driving me nuts," Andi said.

"I know. That's my plan," I said, winking at her.

"You're such a nerd," she said, pulling my Defense book away from me. "You're the only person other than Rose Weasley who ever reads at the dinner table."

"It's just more interesting than this scintillating and enthralling conversation," I snapped.


	3. Death Eater, Womanizer, Tomato, Tomato

**Chapter 3**

**Death Eater, Womanizer, Tomato... Tomato?**

Rose:

"Quidditch trials are the bane of my existence," Albus said, putting his head in his hands as he looked out at the crowd of hopefuls in front of us. I put a hand consolingly on his shoulder.

"It's okay," I said. "You could just let anyone that was on the team last year back on. It's always a good option."

"Rose, you have to try out, just like everyone else," he said, brushing my hand off. "I can't play family favorites. It would start an uproar of angry Gryffindors."

"Ugh," I said. "Fine."

"Okay," he said. "Go stand with the rest of them."

I grudgingly tromped over to stand with Lily and Fred, and Will and Anna. I played Keeper and I had since my third year, which meant there was little chance I wouldn't actually be let back on the team. Lily was a Chaser, and so was Anna, while Will and Fred both played Beater. Albus was the Seeker. All from last year's team, of course. But I figured the team would probably stay somewhat intact…

Albus had started out every Quidditch trial the same since he gained the captaincy in fifth year.

"Hi," he said to all of them. "Welcome to Gryffindor Quidditch trials. If that's not where you thought you were, leave." No one left. "Wonderful. I want to start off by saying this: I understand that I have a lot of family in the Gryffindor House. I will not be playing family favorites. They're all trying out just like you are. And if any of them make it, suck it up and deal with it, they're the best people for the job. Last year's team was made up of five of my family members. We won the cup. The year before it was five of them. We won the cup. So I don't want to hear any moans and groans if any of them make the team. Sound like a plan?

"Okay," he said. "I would like you all to split into the groups based on what position you want to play…"

I walked off to the Keeper pile. There was only one other person interested in playing Keeper, and he was a second year. I would kill Albus if I didn't make the team at this point. The second year looked up at me with a look of fear on his face, as if I hadn't been extra nice to him last year or something. His name was Jeremy, if I remembered correctly…

"Hi," I said kindly.

"Hi," he said timidly.

"Trying out for Keeper, huh?" I said.

"Yeah," he said, gripping his broom carefully.

"It's a fun position," I said. I hoped that didn't sound too possessive. I didn't want him to find me threatening. That wasn't exactly the goal as Head Girl…

"My Mum played for Ravenclaw," he informed me.

"Oh that's cool," I said. "My Dad played for Gryffindor, you know. Mum says he wasn't very good. But I'm not supposed to tell him she said that."

Jeremy laughed. "You were Keeper last year."

"Yeah," I said. "I was."

"I don't expect to beat you out. I just thought I would try it," he said.

"You shouldn't go into it thinking like that," I said. "Then you certainly won't beat me out."

"You're seventeen," he said. "You have to be better than I am."

"If only because my arms are longer," I said.

"Keeper hopefuls, could you take a lap of the pitch?" Albus asked.

"No thanks," I said. "It's kind of cold."

"Rose!" Albus snapped.

"Fine, fine," I said, mounting my broom. Jeremy was laughing next to me.

We took a pretty good lap of the pitch, with me zooming faster and better than my second year friend. But that was only to be expected. I'd been flying since birth, and even if he had been flying since birth, he still had five fewer years of experience under his belt.

We got to wait around while Albus put all of the other positions to the test. He picked Will and Fred for Beaters again, because they were obviously the best choices. Then with the Chasers, he brought Anna on first, a fourth year named Eryn second, and waited to put Lily on the roster until last because he didn't want anyone to think he was playing favorites. He tried the last group of Chasers hard, until one of them, a sixth year, just looked at Albus and yelled, "You might as well just stop now and put her on the team like we all know you're going to do." So he did. After all, Lily was hands down the best Chaser in the Gryffindor house, if not in all of Hogwarts.

Jeremy and I had been used to finalize the Chasers, to test their shooting skills on a real Keeper. But then Lily, Anna and Eryn were used test the two of us. We each got five shots taken on us, two by Anna and Lily and one by Eryn. Whoever blocked the most got to be the Keeper. Jeremy blocked Eryn's shot. So did I. He missed both of Lily's. I missed only one. I blocked both of Anna's, and he only blocked one.

I knew it was petty of me, but I had never really doubted I would make the team.

"So here we are. Gryffindor's team," Albus said happily when we were all settled on the ground. He grinned.

It was an identical team to last year, but instead of James as Chaser, there was now Eryn. They would usually have just kept their old robes and passed on James' to Eryn. But Albus was very particular about numbering. The Seeker was number one and the Keeper number two, with the beaters being six and seven. So it was really on the Chasers who had to change. Albus liked to have the head Chaser be number three, which meant that that title was going to be transferred from James to Lily, with Anna and Eryn getting the other numbers. It was a complex process.

-CD-

Scorpius:

"Do you honestly think she isn't going to let you back on the team?" Emmett demanded in a hush, swinging his Beater's bat at his hip.

"You never know. She can be a sadist," I hissed back, pulling my gloves on.

"She's just controlling and pretentious," Emmett whispered.

"Of course she is," I said, watching as she stretched her arms above her head, then polished her silver whistle on her robes.

"Would you stop talking?" Andi barked at them, dropping the whistle so that it bounced against her chest. "Merlin you would think this was lunch time the way you two chat. These are Quidditch trials. I'm your captain. I might be pretentious and controlling, but with an attitude like that, Mr. Malfoy, I will certainly not let you back on the team."

"Hey, I didn't say controlling and pretentious!" I said, holding my hands up in surrender. "That was Emmett."

"But you agreed," she said, pointing an aggressive gloved finger at me. "So shut your mouth. Or I'll show you sadist."

"You have ears like a bat," I grumbled.

"I know," she said. "All right, listen up all of you. I'm Andi Wiles, and I am the captain of the Slytherin Quidditch team for my second year now. For those of you who don't know me. I am a Chaser, which means, of course, I need Beaters, two more Chasers, a Keeper and a Seeker."

She glanced at me and snorted.

"Thanks," I said.

"That was a snort of approval," she snapped at me.

"Oh," I said, shutting up. Who snorted in approval? Emmett snickered next to me.

"We will start with prospective Seekers. Everyone interested, please step forward," Andi commanded, crossing her arms. I obliged while Emmett tapped me on the shoulder. It was me and my yearly competition. Devon Quest had been attempting to oust me from this position since my third year and Devon's second. Andi groaned. She was just as sick of Devon as I was. Devon wasn't even a good Seeker, he just tried year in and year out. So Andi would truly have to be a sadist for the position to go to anyone but me.

There were some people who were destined to be Quidditch stars. Others were destined to be Quidditch captains. Some, like me, were simply destined to play and be good at it, but never be the world's best, or even Hogwarts best at what I did. In my life, I had met four people genuinely gifted at Quidditch. My captain my second year and first year playing Seeker, Liam Rydell was the first. He was a Keeper who was now playing for Ballycastle full time. The second was the Hufflepuff Chaser, Gemma Weston, who ended up Chasing for Holyhead for a year, before pursuing other interests in the Ministry of Magic. The third was Albus Potter, who was probably the best I had ever met. And finally, there was Andi.

-CD-

"Of course it started raining," Andi grumbled as she shook out her dark hair just inside the Entrance Hall. We were all dripping water like faucets, from our noses, hair, arms. Emmett wrung out Andi's hair with his own hands for her as I wished for a towel. The entire assembled Slytherin team was with us. I got back on, of course, and so did Emmett.

"I'm going to go take a nice hot bath in my fantastic Head Boy's bathroom," I declared.

"Fuck you," Andi complained shaking her hair out. "Prefects' bathroom for me."

"Dingy dorm bathroom for the lowly," Emmett said.

I got out my wand and started drying myself off. It was easier when I wasn't causing a flood.

"Oh Merlin! Are we magic or not?" Andi growled, grabbing her own wand.

I walked away from them, heading toward my own bathroom. Or the bathroom I shared with Rose Weasley, I suppose. I was ready to just go soak and get the deep chill out of my bones.

I loved Hogwarts. It was my home. It was a place where I truly felt like I belonged. It took a while, yes. No one liked me in the beginning. The name Malfoy had an inescapable stigma attached, which was my greatest barrier, truly. It took a while for people to figure out I wasn't all bad—that my father wasn't all bad.

I spat the password at the portrait outside of my bathroom. Beyond it there was a seating area, designed for the Head Boy or Girl if the other one was using the bathroom at the time. I walked right in though, the door let me, though it wouldn't have had the bathroom been in use by Weasley.

It had been hard in the beginning. A couple of my teachers had known my father, and many of my classmates' parents knew him even better. He hadn't been particularly nice to most of them in their time at Hogwarts. But my father wasn't nice to anyone, before he met my mum. And she melted him a little bit, and chipped away the defensive, superior airs he put on.

I loved my father, but we had our differences. Dad was easily upset by anything relating to the past, to who he once was. He was looking toward the future, and he wanted me to be one of his tools. He used me like a claw to hook into society's good graces. I simply wanted to make a name for myself as a decent person. It mattered to me what people thought of my father, yes, because my father was a good man. But I simply wanted to be treated like everyone else, and that was that.

I peeled my slightly damp t-shirt up over my head, dropping it in a heap on the floor, then following it with my jeans and boxers while the taps filled the pool-sized bathtub with hot, sudsy water.

My reputation was different than my father's. I was no longer Malfoy the Death Eater, but Malfoy the womanizer. It was an interesting turn of events. There had been a couple of girls last year and one in my fifth year. But in some strange way, the word got back to my father. He never told my mum, and in some ways, when he talked to me about it, about not being stupid, he almost seemed pleased. He seemed to feel that if this was the worst I did, then he was okay with it.

**CD

_Chapter 4 Preview: "Really? Have fun growing your hair back then."_


	4. Free Squeeze

**Chapter 4.**

**Free Squeeze**

Rose:

"I'm well-behaved," Lily informed Albus, nose to nose with him in the common room. I was looking for some tea and cookies or something, a little entertainment snack. Potter family arguments were the joy of every Gryffindor's existence. Sometimes, they started dueling.

Albus looked down at his sister, puffing up his chest.

"Yeah? Are you?" he said.

"Yes," she said. "Merlin, you would think you were James."

"Well, James isn't here, so it's my job," Albus said. "What were you doing?"

"I was snogging someone," Lily said. "So what of it?"

"That was _more _than snogging," Albus informed her, pointing his finger in her face.

The boy Lily had been kissing attempted to get up from the seat where Albus had ordered him to sit once he had caught him and Lily nearly eating each other's faces.

"Don't move!" Albus said, getting his wand out and pointing it at the poor kid. I laughed and flopped back in my own chair, ready to get some good entertainment.

Lily was well-behaved. For the most part. She and I were both pretty good girls. I was probably the biggest prude of all of our cousins, truth be told. I was the one who didn't have a boyfriend, and hadn't ever had one. I'd been kissed once or twice at some Quidditch parties, but I'd never shagged anyone, or really wanted to for that matter. Lily had had boyfriends, just a couple of them, really. One last year, and apparently one this year. And of course she had kissed them, but from all the fun Weasley-girl get togethers over the summer, I knew for certain that me and Lily and Lucy were the only virgins left in the group.

Vic had Teddy. Molly had a guy named George who she met while she was training to be Healer, Dominique had a French boy fiance named Henri, Roxanne her husband Eric, whom she started dating her fifth year, and… then there was Lucy, Lily and me. Though Lucy and Lily both had boyfriends. So it was sort of just me. Off in my own little world of singlehood. Even all of the boys were better at the love life thing than I was.

"Literally think people would pay _galleons _to watch this," Anna informed me from where she was stretched out on the floor in front of my chair. She was propped up on an elbow to watch the Potter siblings bicker. Most of the Gryffindor house was amused at this point. Except for Lily, Albus and the poor kid Lily was snogging.

"I cannot _wait _until you leave Hogwarts!" Lily snapped at him. She offered her hand to her boyfriend. He warily stood up with her and Lily pulled them in the direction of the boys' dormitory.

"Where are you going?" Albus demanded.

Lily pulled out her wand, pointing at him. "Shut up, Albus."

"Merlin, how do you handle this?" Anna asked, laughing. She flopped onto her back, shaking her head. "Are all family moments like this?"

"Just Potter ones," I said, grinning.

Albus dropped into the chair next to me, sighing heftily.

"She's going up to his room," he informed me.

"She's not going to do anything. She's just doing it to make you mad," I said, fishing around for my bag and pulling out some homework.

"Well it's working," Albus said, crossing his arms.

"You gotta let her live, Albus," Anna informed him sitting up and crossing her legs so that she was looking at him. "If you make her mad, she's not going to come to you if she actually needs you. Trust me. This comes from a girl with an older brother."

"I know, I know," Albus said. "But he was groping her!"

"She's fifteen," I offered.

"Rose, you're nearly eighteen. How many blokes have groped you?" Albus wondered.

"That is simply by choice," I said stiffly, scratching my quill aggressively across the parchment.

"Says you," Albus said. "Look, Matt Barton from Ravenclaw really likes you."

"I don't care," I said. "I don't like him."

"Come on," Albus said. "Just go to Hogsmeade with him or something."

"No thank you," I said.

"Stubborn. That's what you are," he said.

"Rose, if you only focus on academics, you're never going to get anywhere," Anna informed me. "You need to let your hair down a little."  
>"The Head Girl can't quite let her hair down all that much," I said.<p>

"Not for the whole world to see," Anna said. "Of course not. But you should do it in private, like the rest of us."

Albus raised his eyebrows, looking down at Anna.

"I'm just saying," she said, grinning at him. Albus grinned back.

I rolled my eyes. Flirty children.

I scratched with my quill across my Potions essay.

"I think Rose needs a little bit of a fling," Colleen contributed, sitting down next to Anna.

"And why would that be?" I asked calmly, not looking up at any of them.

"Because you are uptight," Colleen said. "And you need to let yourself relax. You only get to be seventeen once."

"I am not… uptight," I said, gripping my quill more tightly.

Albus snorted. "Yeah. Okay."

"I'm not!" I said.

"Rose… Do you remember last year when Evan Thomas slapped you on the arse after you two kissed during the Quidditch Cup after party?" Anna questioned.

"Yeah!" I said. "He slapped me on the arse!"

"Barely," Colleen said. "It was more of a pat."

"Still," I said, crossing my arms.

"Still," Anna agreed. "The point is that you had just shoved your tongue down the guys' throat and couldn't handle a little more than that."

"I didn't want him to do that!" I shouted.

"Rose, Rose, Rose," Anna said. "Live. Breathe. You're seventeen. You have so much to offer and you just need to offer it."

"I'm not going to wear a sign on my chest that says "Free Squeeze" if that's the kind offer you mean," I said.

"That is so far from the kind of offer I mean," Anna said, throwing her hands up in the air.

"What she means," Colleen said, "is that you need to be more in touch with your fun, flirty, hot, sexual side. We all have one. You just need to let yours out, Rose."

Albus snorted. "Rose wears a chastity belt, ladies. It's not going to happen."

"My fun, flirty, hot, sexual side?" I repeated.

"A sex kitten is inside you somewhere," Anna declared.

"Uh?" I said.

"Ew," Albus contributed.

"You just gotta let her out," Colleen said.

-CD-

Scorpius:

"Stop," Weasley hissed at me, her wand trained level with my nose.

"No," I said.

"It's bothering me," she said. I could see that it was more than just _bothering _her.

"You actually think I care," I said, barking a laugh. She whipped her wand through the air and I literally had to duck to avoid her spell. I had turned the floor around her into melted lava, save for her own little stone square. I only did it because she kept trying to correct me on my pronunciation of one of the spells. She was probably right, but it grated on me. So I decided to annoy her.

With another wave of her wand, she had turned the floor back to solid and sprung lightly forward, slashing her wand aggressively.

"What was that supposed to be?" I demanded, laughing at the ineffective spell.

The Transfiguration class was transfixed on us. The teacher, Professor Zeitlin, even seemed a little amused. Weasley and I were always good entertainment. How we ever got the honor of being Head Boy and Girl was beyond me. We fought too much, in front of everyone. I figured it was probably because we used such phenomenal magic.

"Really? _What was that supposed to be?_" she mimicked. "Have fun growing your hair back then."

I reached up in shock, rubbing the top of my head. All I could feel was the smoothness of bare, bald skin. I used my usual spell to grow hair, waving my wand around my head. Then I felt to check. Nothing.

Rose turned on her heel and stalked away.

"That is not a good look for you Scorp," Andi contributed from the desks. I pointed my wand after Weasley, before she could march back to her desk, and stuck her shoe to the floor. She tripped forward and fell flat on her face.

"Ow…" she said, getting up. She was holding her nose, which was bleeding. She waved her own wand at it and muttered a few things under her breath. The blood disappeared and her nose seemed healed.

"Okay, okay, that's enough, Mr. Malfoy, Miss Weasley," Professor Zeitlin said, holding up his hand. He tended to get annoyed—as did most teachers—when blood was being spilled. I was still muttering spells at my head to get my hair to grow back. It wasn't working.

"Grow my hair back, Weasley," I hissed.

"No. You broke my nose," she said, settling back down next to Anna Robins, who was chuckling.

"Professor?" I appealed, my pride taking a stab as I did so. "Could you give me a hand?"

"Certainly, Mr. Malfoy," Professor Zeitlin said. "Everyone back to your work, please." He worked some magic around my head, and I waited hopefully. I probably stood there for five minutes, waiting patiently, and then impatiently.

"Professor?" I questioned.

"I can't get it to grow back, Mr. Malfoy," he said.

"Weasley!" I growled, storming up to her desk.

She looked up from her paper. "Yes?"

"Grow my bloody hair back," I ordered.

"No," she said. "You broke my nose, Malfoy. You're going to have to ask more nicely than that."

"Grow my hair back," I commanded, pointing my wand in her face.

She rolled her eyes and looked up at me. "I don't know. It seems to me that you would like to remain bald."

"I'm going to hex you, Weasley," I snapped, glaring heatedly at her.

She shrugged. "Try me."

I glared at her some more, taking a deep breath. It was a struggle for me—between risking my badge and wounding my pride.

"Weasley, please grow my hair back," I muttered under my breath.

"I didn't quite hear that," she said sweetly. Anna snickered next to her.

"Please grow my hair back." I managed not to growl the words at her.

She sighed and stood up, waving her wand carelessly. Finally, I felt my hair again, the familiar shag in front of my eyes. Weasley sat back down and returned to her work without another word. Grumbling under my breath, I went to go sit down with Andi and Emmett again.

"Ugh," I said.

"She's a first class bitch," Andi said. "It's fairly amazing."

"Only to me," I said. "She's nice to everyone else. She's nice to you. She's nice to Emmett. Even though you guys don't like her either."

"I know," Andi said. "But she is a first class bitch to you. It might be because you're a first class prick to her, but I can't be sure."

"I think that's probably it," Emmett contributed.

I ran my hands protectively through my hair, frowning. Bitch. That was the only word I could find to describe Rose Weasley. It might have been cruel of me, but it was true. But only to me. Because we were competition and we had been since the first day. That wasn't something we would get over anytime soon. I had to beat her. I had to. And I would do whatever I had to win some victory over her.

* * *

><p>Chapter 5 Preview: "Why do you look like you're going to kill someone?"<p> 


	5. A Slytherinish Slytherin

**Chapter 5**

**A Slytherinish Slytherin**

Rose:

I was failing to see why it so desperately mattered to my friends that I end my singlehood. I had more important things in my life than spreading my legs for some dashing Ravenclaw boy… I wanted to be an auror. That meant I couldn't waste time now flirting my heart out with the first boy I saw. I could do that later—after I had a job lined up. Or maybe when I was dead and didn't need to work anymore.

It wasn't like I had self-esteem issues or was undesirable or something. I wasn't one of those girls who went around moping and moaning about how ugly I was and how no one would ever love me. Truth be told, I knew I was at least a little better than acceptable looking. I just didn't have the time or patience for a relationship. I was decent-looking, spunky, red-haired, the works, as Anna would put it. She failed to see how I could possibly not want to exploit that. But I didn't. I dressed how I wanted, which meant my blouses were just as tight as the other girls' and my skirts just as short, my jeans were as arse-hugging and my shirts as low cut. I just didn't want to deal with the boys who liked these things.

So instead of hanging out with my boyfriend—and not because I didn't have one, though I didn't have one—I spent the last Saturday before our first Hogsmeade trip in the library, studying. I had my legs tucked up under me, at one of the desks in the back of the Restricted Section, where the desks were part of the shelves and books towered above my head. I had plowed through a mountain of homework already, and no one would bother me where I was. The librarian loved me, and as a seventh year I could peruse wherever I wanted. I usually chose to do my homework, then, beneath the more sinister books the Hogwarts library had to offer.

I was next to a window, which was fairly nice. This morning we had our first real Quidditch practice. The team was shaping up very nicely, which we all knew it would. Albus had a knack for captaining teams. I just hoped the scouts of the world would look on him with favor in the upcoming matches.

Now, the grounds were bathed in a mid-afternoon sunlight. The lake sparkled, and it all still looked pretty warm out there. I figured if I finished early, I might head out to the grounds after dinner and before we had to be in our common rooms. It was nice enough for a good evening stroll around the lake.

"Merlin, why do you insist upon barricading yourself all the way back here?" Albus demanded, appearing from around one of the shelves. I looked up at him, wondering how he found me.

"Because here, people don't bother me," I hinted.

He laughed. "I don't count. I'm your favorite person in the world."  
>"Yeah…" I said. "I guess that's probably it…"<p>

He chuckled. "Don't deny it."

"What are you doing here?" I wondered, dipping my quill into my ink and starting another sentence of one of my essays.

"Looking for you," he said.

"I figured as much," I said. "What can I do for you?"

"I have a question for you," he said. But he didn't continue. He just stood there, leaning against the desk.

I slowly looked up at him. "_Yes?"_

"Do you think… if I asked… Anna would go to Hogsmeade with me?" he wondered.

I focused more carefully on him. "Anna? You like Anna?" I had figured as much, but I was still surprised.

"Yeah," he admitted, blushing a little. "I mean… yeah."

"Huh…" I said. "I mean, I thought so, but wow."

"Well?" he prompted. "Do you think she would go with me?"

"I can't say what Anna will or won't do," I said. "She's unpredictable. Remember her tea leaves in Divination? A blob. A big, fat, incomprehensible blob."

"But how do you think my chances are?" he asked.

I shrugged. "Pretty good."

"Really?" he said, looking relieved.

"I mean, I would say she's pretty interested in you too," I said. "But she's never said so to me, because I'm your cousin, and if you know Anna, you know everything is very first year for her. She likes to keep it a secret from the guy she likes that she likes him, until the opportunity strikes, or she's certain he likes her too."

"I do," Albus said, grinning. "She's fairly amazing."  
>I laughed. "Okay then. I say give it a shot. Albus, you're practically eighteen. Pluck up some courage, why don't you?"<p>

"Fine," he said. "Courage. Plucking. Thanks for your help, Rosie."

"Of course," I said. "Anytime."

"But…" he said.

"But what?" I said.

"Nothing," he said, turning to leave.

"Albus, speak your mind, please," I said, sighing exasperatedly.

"I think… I think you should try things with Matt Barton," he declared.

I sighed heftily. "Really? Are we still on that? Look, Al, if I wanted a boyfriend, I feel like I could probably get one—"

"Exactly!" he said. "Tons of blokes are interested in you!"

"Great," I grumbled. "Albus, that's not the point. The point is, I _don't _want one."

He sighed. "Really? Come on, Rose. You can't tell me you actually enjoy going to Hogsmeade alone."

"I never go alone. Usually one of my friends doesn't have a date," she said. "Or you, or Lily, or someone I can tolerate… I don't know why everyone care so much. If I don't care… then why should everyone else?"

"I don't know," he said. "I just think you're standing in the way of your own happiness."

"Tell you what, Al. If I can find a guy who can pique my interest enough for me to care, I will jump on the chance. But there hasn't been a guy to do so."

"Fine," Albus said, turning to leave. Someone brushed past him, a blonde head on a tall body—taller than Albus.

"Oh goody," I said, rolling my eyes. "Go get her, Al."

"Will do," he said.

-CD-

Scorpius:

I was hunting for the right book. I needed it for my own personal reading pleasure. Which often worried the librarian. When I told her I needed to go into the Restricted Section for individual reading purposes, she often gave me a look that said "What could you possibly want in there?" But I was a strong believer that a man had to know his enemy to combat him effectively. So I read up on the darkest magic Hogwarts would allow me to read up on and wondered how I would resist it.

I wanted to be an auror. I would accept very little else in my life. I had a goal and I refused to be deterred. I was hoping Harry Potter would look past the family name and let me into his world. My father was hoping the same. Dad would probably have some version of a break down if I didn't get let into the auror training program.

Invading my book-finding area was a certain black-haired individual. My Quidditch rival—and I would probably grudgingly admit, Quidditch superior—was leaning against one of the shelves. I knew well enough that Albus Potter, though smart, wasn't much of an academic. Which meant that where he was, there was most likely Rose Weasley. I knew she did her homework in here; I'd run into her often enough. While I was different, and preferred to do my homework sometime in the dead of night, she preferred to get it out of the way. Maybe she liked sleep. I didn't.

I brushed past Potter and heard Weasley specifically grumble. "Oh goody."

I laughed. We weren't friends. We never would be. But I sure got a good deal of amusement out our rivalry. I was sure she did too.

Of course it would turn out, because we were destined to bicker about something every day, that my book was most certainly in the section where Rose Weasley was so studiously working. Grumbling to myself, I rounded the corner again, starting to scan the shelves around her. She kept her nose down, scratching the quill across her parchment with indifference.

No one could deny that Rose Weasley was an appealing girl. Emmett and I had established that a long, long time ago. She was abnormally tall, yes, but she had nice legs and a nice face, and despite the obnoxious color, fairly nice hair. Emmett had once she he wouldn't mind shagging her, despite the fact that I figured she would probably gab through the whole thing. She was a loudmouth and too opinionated to sleep with.

I froze, hand extended out toward the bookshelf to the right of where she was working. I loved ideas like this. Ones that just came out of nowhere and hit me in the face. Shaking life back into myself, to appear as if nothing was out of the ordinary, I pulled the book from the shelf. It was still not what I was looking for. I shoved it back, and noted the book, just above the right hand corner of Weasley's desk. I reached for it, trying not to bump into her. She looked up at me. She wore glasses only when she was doing homework. It was weird to see.

"Excuse me," I said coolly.

"Yeah," she said back, as if I had done her some great personal wrong.

I grinned to myself. I simply loved irking her. I grabbed the book I wanted and pulled it off the shelf, examining it. It was exactly what I wanted. Exactly. I turned on my heel and stalked away, book under my arm.

Slytherins had a certain reputation. I knew it as well as the next bloke—we were sneaky, cunning, plotting and scheming sorts. While we had gained ourselves a decent reputation of sorts in the years since the Second War, we had never lost the true traits that made our house, and its founder, what it really was.

I for one was thoroughly infused with the sinister plotting mind that came with being a Slytherin. I'd also been born with an unquenchable desire to win, to destroy, to best, to outsmart… to be number one. Always standing my way of that, always elbowing her way into the lime light, to monopolize or share it with me, was Rose Weasley. I always wanted to find the one thing I could beat her at.

Maybe I had found it. Maybe this was my chance.

I wished that there weren't people around me as I left the Restricted Section. I would have just loved to break out into an evil cackle. But I didn't need people thinking I was off my rocker. I had to maintain my place in the eyes of the school population. So instead, I checked out my book and headed into the hallway, whistling cheerfully to myself. In some ways, cheery whistling, when coming from me, was almost more worrying than evil sinister laughter.

"Why do you look like you're going to kill someone?" Emmett asked me. He and Andi were sitting just outside in the courtyard, practicing Charms together.

"No reason," I said, grinning to myself.

"Oh dear," Andi said. "You are a psychopath. I become more and more sure of it every day."

I plopped down onto the stone bench with them. "It's all working out fine, Andi. Don't worry. I'm behaving."

"Sure you are," she said. "Your face says you're anything but behaving."

"I know," he said. "But misbehaving is what I do best. Behind the scenes of course. Can't have the establishment knowing what a bad child I am. They would take away my badge!" I put my hand over my Head Boy's badge protectively.

Andi laughed. "You're such a weird person. But I pity the target of your psychosis. They never fare well, those poor, sad, souls…"

Preview: "Poor girl's going to be crushed..."


	6. Just Weasley, Still a Person

_**A/N: I'd offer a long explanation about where I've been but it would be longer than the chapter. **_

**Chapter 6:**

**Just Weasley, Still a Person**

Rose:

"Hi, Rose," Matt Barton said to me as I walked by the Ravenclaw table. Cue characteristic redhead blush.

"Hi," I mumbled back. It wasn't like I was embarrassed because I was smitten with him or something. I was embarrassed because I wasn't used to it. I mean, I got attention, but…

"Oh my God," Colleen complained. She slammed her hand against her forehead. "You are quite literally the epitome of awkward." I dropped into the seat next to her at the Gryffindor table.

"I'm sorry!" I grumbled, fumbling for coffee. "Goodness. If you like it so much, flirt with him. Have you seen Anna and Albus?'

"No…" Colleen said. "I mean… not for a while. He stopped her outside the Great Hall. Didn't you pass them on your way in?"

"I didn't," I said, glancing toward the door. "I was just talking to Albus in the library. He's asking her to go to Hogsmeade with him."

"Thank Merlin! Finally," she said. "That kid has been lusting after her for so long now. You just see it in the way he looks at her. All big eyed and wondering… like she's the pyramids and he's seeing her for the first time…"

"Yeah…" I said. "That's pretty much what it is."

"Did you encourage this?" Colleen said. "Because I think it's perfect."

"Do you think she will say yes?" I wondered.

"Yeah, probably," Colleen said. "I mean, it's Anna. Of course she'll say yes. She'd say yes to pretty much anyone, but she looks Albus like he's a little more than just anyone. I think she admires his captaining skills truth be told. She admires the control and the masculinity or something. I don't know…"

"She should admire him for the Quidditch brain he's got. Albus is way too smart for his own good. But he devotes about ninety percent of that intelligence to Quidditch and the other ten to actual academic work."

"He gets good marks though," Colleen said. "That's what matters."

"Do you think it's a good sign that neither of them have showed up?" I asked, glancing toward the doors again.

"Er… I would say so," she replied. "Unless they were both so mortified… But I can't really see there being any mortification."

"Yeah…" I said. "But you never know. Where else could they have gone? It's not like they went to make out or something. Even Anna would wait until a date or at least a few somewhat deep conversations before commencing the lip lock."

"Maybe they went to have a somewhat deep conversation in order to hasten along the lip lock," Colleen declared, laughing brightly.

"Right…" I said, pulling my eyes away from the food at toward dinner.

"You never know," she said. "Anna and Albus. I think it's perfect."  
>"Who knows? A lot of people find their true love at Hogwarts," I said. "My parents. A couple aunts and uncles… We in the wizarding world like to marry young and get on with life from there."<p>

"Hey don't go sending out the marriage announcements on them yet. Anna would kill you," Colleen warned.

Albus flopped into the seat next across from me then, heaving a sigh.

"What's wrong?" I demanded. "Did she say no?"

Albus shook his head.

"She said yes?" I said.

He nodded, and broke out into a furious grin. For someone so popular and so Quidditch-famous, he sure was awkward when it came to girls.

"Yay!" Colleen said, clapping her hands excitedly. "Our two best friends, going on a date!"

"Yeah, calm down," Albus said. "Here she comes."

Anna waltzed down the aisle then, looking a lot like she owned the place, truth be told. She seemed completely thrilled. She settled comfortably next to Albus and Colleen and I looked at her expectantly.

"What?" she demanded.

"Did anything interesting just happen?" I inquired kindly.

"I'm sure he already told you," Anna said, laughing. "But yeah. Albus and I are going to Hogsmeade together next week."

Colleen clapped her hands again.

"So… that makes everyone but Rose," Anna declared looking at me pointedly.

"What?" I said, startled. "Colleen doesn't have a date!"

"Of course she does," Anna said. "Were you even paying attention at breakfast? Merlin. Sean McDonald asked her! From Hufflepuff? The really cute one with the freckles?"

"Freckles?" I said. "And Sean? Are you trying to keep the Irish undiluted in your veins?"

"I'm from Ireland!" Colleen exclaimed. "Is that a bad thing?"

I shrugged. "I look more Irish than you do."

Colleen laughed. "Whatever. You should have paid attention this morning."

"Sorry, sorry," I said.

"The point of the conversation though, is that you are going to be completely alone at Hogsmeade. Even Lily has a date," Anna declared.

"Shut up," I said. "I don't need a date to be happy. I am perfectly content to walk around Hogsmeade alone, thank you very much."

"That is such a lie," Colleen said.

"Make me a promise, Rose," Anna said.

"No," I said. "I'm not making any promises to you."

"Come on," Anna said. "Just say that if Matt Barton asks you to Hogsmeade, you will at least give him a chance and go with him."

"No," I said. "I'm not making any promises."

"But look at him," Colleen mumbled. "He's absolutely gorgeous."

"I suppose so," I said, glancing over at Matt.

"Come on Rosie, just do it," Albus said, grinning from across the table.

"I'd rather not," I said.

"But you're going to do it anyway because you love us," Anna said.

-CD-

Scorpius:

"I think that's a downright horrible idea," Andi declared. "Funny, maybe, but horrible. I can't imagine if someone did that to me, Scorp…"

"Come on," I said. "It's not that bad… I'm not going to force her to sleep with me. Obviously. I'm just going to trick her into thinking I could be actually interested in her… and then maybe get her to sleep with me that way. And because I am smarter than her, it will backfire on her, and it will be a big laugh in her face when she finds out I was just using her."

"I'm so confused about where your logic comes from," Emmett said, shaking his head. "You're basically a horrible person."

"I know," I said. "But… I'll be nice about it."

"Nice about tricking Rose Weasley into sleeping with you…" Emmett mused. "Scorp, do you honestly think that's going to work? She might not be experienced in the whole guy department but she is smart. And you of all people ought to know that…"

"I do," I said. "But I still think I can win."  
>'Why is everything a win or lose for you?" Andi demanded. "I think you're being a prick. I do. That's my honest opinion."<p>

"Andi…" I said. "How about this… how about I attempt to trick her into sleeping with me, but I don't do it? I get pretty far, but not _that _far?"

She thought about it for a moment. "Poor girl's going to be crushed…"  
>"But?" he prompted.<p>

"But I think that's better," she said. "It is... And I will probably laugh when you describe her expression when you've all but got her naked and you say 'Just kidding! I win!'"

"You're going to burn in hell, and then Rose will laugh at you," Emmett announced.

"Yes but…" I said. "Since I don't believe in Hell or any of that crap that comes with organized Muggle religion, I'm already going to Hell, if it does exist. So I'm not really hurting myself here."

Andi still frowned at me, though, and I didn't quite know why.

"Oh come off it," I said to her, throwing my hands up exasperatedly. "I'm not that horrible of a person."  
>"You sometimes act like it," she said, shrugging.<p>

"It's just Weasley," I said.

"Yeah," Andi said. "But contrary to sometimes popular belief, she is still a human."

"I know she is," I said.

"So do you think it's really right to treat her like you're planning?" Andi said.

"You said yourself that it would be kind of funny," I protested.

"Oh, it will be funny," Andi said. "But I don't envy her."

"Of course you don't," I said. "That's not the point."

Andi shook her head.

"What do you think?" I turned to Emmett, waiting for him to back me up wholeheartedly.

"I think if anyone in this world deserves it, it would be her," Emmett said. "I just think you're probably going to end up shooting yourself in the foot. I know you're brilliant and all that, but you still might not be able to deceive her effectively. She's not necessarily going to be duped so easily, and I think you're not thinking things through very carefully."

"Emmett, Emmett," I said. "Do you know me at all? The plan is just in its early stages—it's a root if you will, an egg. It needs incubation before I can use it."

"So you're going to take said egg and hatch it under a toad," Andi said.

"Did you honestly just compare this to a basilisk?" I demanded. "Merlin. You would think I was some Dark Wizard or something the way you two go on. I'm not breeding killers, Andi. I'm being a womanizer. There's a difference."

She sniffed derisively, turning to her attention to her food.

"Since when do you care what I do?" I demanded, not letting it go.

"Just drop it mate," Emmett suggested.

"I care what you do because you're just… toying with people for the fun of it," she said. "And it used to be funny, when we were in fourth year… Now it's not. Now I get what these girls feel like when you destroy them."

"No one has destroyed you," I said.

"I know that," she said. "But I can imagine what it would feel like if someone had."

"Andi…" I said. "Come off it. It's Rose Weasley."

"She's still a person, Scorpius!" she snapped.

"You are no fun," I said. "You would usually be cheering me on at this point. Clapping your hands and waving flags… All of a sudden…"

"Yeah, I know," she said. "And I'm ashamed of how I have acted before now."

"You've never even had a legitimate boyfriend," I informed her. "How can you think about how you would feel—"

"Oh shut up," she said, slamming her fork onto her plate. "Shut up, will you?"  
>She got up from the table and stormed away grumpily, leaving her bag.<p>

I looked at the empty seat she left behind and turned to Emmett. "What do you think?"  
>"I think go ahead," he said. "I think go ahead and do it. After all, it is Rose Weasley. But don't tell Andi. And don't tell her I told you that."<p>

I sighed. "Fine. Whatever. I don't understand why she's reacting this way."

"It's probably that time of the month," Emmett said.

"Ugh," I said.

"I know. Talk about a Basilisk," Emmett said, shaking his head. "Look… I think you can do this to Rose Weasley without permanently scarring her."

"I think I can too," I said.

"So… just try to keep it on the down low from Andi and you should be alright," he said.

"She's overreacting about something," I said. "She probably had a bad day."

"I dunno," Emmett said.

I glanced over at the Gryffindor table. Rose was talking to Albus about something, looking very deep in conversation. I was going to best her once and for all. I didn't really care what it took. I was just going to do it.

"It helps that she's fairly pretty," Emmett said, following my gaze.

"Freakishly tall," I pointed out.

"Of for sure," Emmett said. "But also very hot. Remember that."

"Point taken," I said, grinning a little.


	7. The Best Plans

**Chapter 7:**

**The Best Plans**

Rose:

"Hey… hey, Rose! Rose!"

I ducked my head a little, wondering how long I could get away pretending I couldn't hear Matt Barton calling me. I figured by the time we got to Charms class, I would probably have to stop feigning deafness, but until then…

"Rose!" he was closer now. He must have shoved several first years out of the way to gain ground on me.

I glanced over my shoulder. Big mistake. Matt grinned and closed the final few feet between us, reaching my shoulder.

"Hey," he said.

"Hi," I said.

"Didn't you hear me calling you? I have been calling you since you left Potions," he said.

"Oh…" I said. "No. I must have been involved in my own head."  
>"Oh, yeah," he said. "That makes sense." He grinned at me again.<p>

"Yeah," I said, nodding definitively.

"So I have a question for you," he said.

Oh no. Oh no, oh no, oh no.

"What's that?" I said, crossing my arms across my chest. I was suddenly very uncomfortable.

"I was wondering…" he cleared his throat and adjusted his tie. "Would you like to go to Hogsmeade with me?"

"Oh…" I said, trying to act surprised.

"Yeah," he said. "I mean… if you don't want to… I understand…" He looked genuinely embarrassed now, color flooding into his cheeks. He cleared his throat again and gave me a wounded puppy look.

"No, no," I said. Oh Merlin. I couldn't possibly say no to him. Not when he had that look on his face. Besides, he was a nice guy…. "I'll go with you. Yeah… I mean… Yeah."

"Really?" he said, visibly sighing in relief.

"Yeah," I said.

"Oh good. Good thank you," he said.

"There's no reason to thank me," I said, smiling at him. "Come on, we should probably pick up the pace or we'll be late to Charms."

"Oh right," he said. "I forgot about class." He grinned at me again and we both pushed into the Charms classroom.

I sat down next to Albus, making it pretty clear to Matt that I wasn't intending on sitting next to him.

"Why are you all red?" Albus asked as I pulled out my Charms stuff. Matt sat down a couple of seats to the right a few rows up.

"I have a Hogsmeade date," I grumbled under my breath.

"Matt?" he said, whipping his head around.

"Yeah," I whispered.

My friends, sitting in front of me, swiveled in their seats to look at me. "Did we just hear you correctly?"

"Yes," I muttered, looking down and away from them.

"Yes!" Anna squealed. Colleen clapped her hands excitedly, bouncing up and down in her seat.

"Finally!" she cheered. She was too loud. Matt was looking over at us now—which meant he could see them making a big deal about it, and me not making much of a big deal about it at all. I felt bad. But… I was doing my best.

Albus glanced over at Matt. "So do I have to threaten him or something? Tell him not to mess with you?"  
>"Shut up, please," I said. My cheeks had to be darker than my hair at this point.<p>

"No can do, Rosie," he said. "It is my job to look out for you. Sometimes you forget that."  
>"It is <em>not <em>your job," I protested.

"Someone's gotta do it, and I'm the oldest Weasley left here at Hogwarts," he said.

"You're not even a Weasley," I mumbled, crossing my arms grumpily.

"Oh come off it, that's the most insulting thing I think I've ever heard from you, Weasley," he said, rolling his eyes.

"Can we just focus on our Charm work? _Please?" _I pleaded.

"Class hasn't even started yet," Albus said.

"You're at our mercy until the class is called to attention," Anna said gleefully.

"If I throw myself off the Astronomy Tower, would you even _miss _me?" I demanded.

"Well yes," Colleen said. "Mostly because we'd miss having someone to make fun of all the time."

"Yep. Gonna do it," I said. "Today. After dinner. If you see something fly by a tower window, don't worry. It's just me. Plummeting. To my death. And when you discover my mangled and bloody body at the base of the castle, pinned to my robes will be a note. And the note will simply say, 'My friends made me do it.' And no one will have any doubt about what sadistic, cruel people you really are."

"Oh come on," Anna said, smiling innocently. "Do the words sadistic and cruel really describe me?" She smiled at, fluttering her eyelashes in a fashion that I figured she thought was innocent and cute.

"Not really," Albus said.

"Oh dear Merlin," Colleen said, rolling her eyes. "This is going to be nauseating isn't it?"

"It's already nauseating."

-CD-

Scorpius:

"Ha. Ha. Ha." Andi's muttered tone made me look up from the hangman game I was playing with Emmett.

"What?" I said, looking at her.

"Looks like you lose," she said.

"Huh?" I said, looking around stupidly now.

"As much as I was all for your little Rose Weasley scheme," she said. All for it? Was she forgetting storming away from the Slytherin table? Selective memory or something? "Well… you lose."

"I don't lose," I said. "What do you mean I lose?"

"It _appears _that she is going to Hogsmeade with someone else," Andi declared, crossing her arms proudly.

"Oh," I said, looking back down at my hangman. "Matt Barton. Yeah, so what? I don't lose."

"Yes you do! If she has a boyfriend, how are you going to have a prayer?"

"For one thing, Andi, she doesn't have a boyfriend," I said. "She has a _date. _Completely different. That changes nothing. However, if he does become her boyfriend—which I am extremely doubtful that he will, seeing as she _is _Weasley and all that—I'm still not going to be deterred. In fact, wouldn't it be more fun to ruin her relationship and trick her into bed and not fuck her?"

"Oh Merlin," she complained. "Your definition of fun is fucked up."

"I do try," I said, drawing the leg on the poor man to be hanged.

"I don't understand how sadistic you are," she said.

"I don't understand how the entirety of the Charms classroom isn't hearing this whole conversation," Emmett contributed. "B."

"Wrong again," I said, drawing the left leg now.

"See," Emmett said. "I don't think you're actually going to do this."

I looked up at him now, a glare manifesting itself on my face. "Why not?"

"Because deep down somewhere, you have a soul," Emmett explained. "it might be a bit of a pit of sorts, and yeah, it's sort of tough to find behind that black hole you call a heart… but nonetheless, if you haven't come into contact with Dementors any time recently, I would say you probably have a soul. And people with souls don't do the stuff you're saying you're going to do. Not that I don't heartily support you. I just don't see it happening. I think it's going to backfire."

"Why would it backfire?" I said, glancing over at Rose Weasley who was practically beating her face against her notebook. She was beet red. It really did clash with her hair in a hideous manner.

"Because," Emmett said, "the best plans always do."

-CD-

Scorpius:

"It's going to backfire," Andi said.

"Oh of course it is," Emmett agreed.

They didn't know I could hear them. In fact, they didn't even know I was around. The two of them were inside the seventh-year boys' dormitory, chatting about my plan with Rose Weasley.

"You don't actually support him, do you?" Andi questioned.

"No, of course not," Emmett said.

"Then why don't you say so?" she demanded. "You just let him act so horrible!"

"I would if I thought he had a chance of being successful," Emmett said.

'What do you think is going to happen? Do you think she'll play him?"

"Rose Weasley doesn't know how to play anyone," Emmett scoffed. "No I think he's going to fall in love with her."

"But Scorpius Malfoy doesn't fall in love with anyone," Andi pointed out.

"Yeah, but things change," Emmett said. "I suppose. And I see it. The two of them would be the perfect couple. They are both insufferable know it alls."

"That is so true," Andi agreed.

"But I don't know," Emmett said. "Whatever happens, he's not going to be successful."

"Yeah," Andi said. "Well… at least we don't have to worry about that sort of thing."

"I know," Emmett said.

And then I heard it. The audible, very obvious sound of people kissing. And I knew they were the only ones in there—who clearly had no idea how to close a door.

But kissing! Them! They were going to fuck up the friendship trio.

Not that I hadn't already tried fucking it up by shagging Andi. But this was worse. This was actual, real kissing, and it seemed like they actually meant it.

The only thing was, why didn't they tell me? It wasn't like I would care or anything—I could genuinely be happy for them. And I was! I just wished they would have told me. The two of them would make a good couple.

"Should we tell Scorpius?" Andi asked after a moment, an answer to all of my thoughts.

"I dunno," Emmett said. "I thought we weren't going to until things got off the ground."

"You're straddling me on your bed as you kiss my neck and slide your fingers under my blouse. This isn't off the ground?" Andi demanded.

"I guess it is," Emmett said, letting out a low, throaty chuckle.

"I feel like he is astute enough to figure it out. It's been since July at this point, Emmett. Don't you think we ought to…?" she said.

_July? _Merlin! Well that explained why she suddenly viewed Rose Weasley as a human. Andi suddenly sympathized with her, now that she had her first real relationship to go off of.

I decided I would speed this decision process up on my own terms. It was their choice to leave their door open. I pushed it right on open and walked swiftly into the room. I froze, pretending to be in utter shock at the sight of the two of them. She was on her back on his bed, and he was, in fact, straddling her, his shirt unbuttoned as he kissed her neck.

"Oh Merlin," I said, laughing a little. Perhaps a little too loudly. I didn't care. But Andi picked up on it.

"Oh come on!" Andi said, pushing Emmett away from her and sitting up. "How long have you been outside the door?"

"So I'm going to fall in love with Rose Weasley?" I said, looking at Emmett speculatively.

He colored and shrugged his shoulders.

"You two should have told me," I declared.

"We were going to," Andi said.

"_July?" _I pointed out.

"Oh…" she said. "You heard that too?"

"Of course I did," I said.

"Oh."

"Well how did it all happen?" I wondered.

"I don't know…" Andi said. "We were meeting up one day while you were with your parents in Spain… and then one thing led to another—"

"Long story short, we ended up snogging," Emmett said.

"Wow," I said.

"Yep," Andi said. "And we're happy about it."

"If you're happy about it, you should have told me," I said.

"We just weren't sure…" Emmett said.

"About how you would take it," Andi replied.

"Why not?" I said. "I've broken the friend rules before, Andi. You know this as well as I do."

"Yeah, I suppose," she said.

"I mean, I really am happy for you two," I said. "I just have one thing to say."

"What?"

"To spare my innocent eyes, could you please learn how to close and lock a dormitory. I don't need to see anymore than snogging, please. Emmett's bare arse is not something I wish to catch in full view."

Andi laughed. "Will do."

"Oh calm down," Emmett said. "We've shared a dorm room for six years and counting. You've seen it before."  
>"And I don't want a repeat of the incident."<p> 


	8. Chaos

_**A/N: Hello! So after a lengthy hiatus, I am back! This is my current work in progress. I love this fic (It's been like a year, hasn't it?) and I want to keep going. Hope some of you are still out there!**_

**Chapter Eight: Chaos **

Scorpius:

I felt like a bloody third wheel. This was highly unacceptable. I liked to go solo to most Hogsmeade weekends, sure, but it was different back when Emmett and Andi weren't… doing whatever they were doing. Now that I knew they were doing stuff, I couldn't help but feel like I was perpetually intruding upon couple time.

I glared at their hands, which they held, swinging between them as they walked down the snowy Hogsmeade street. All I wanted was an opportune moment to dart off to some perfect distraction, to leave the two of them alone without being awkward about it.

"Speaking of awkward," I mumbled to the two of them, gesturing ahead.

"No one was speaking of awkward…" Andi said, glancing at me but following my gesture. A few yards in front of us, Rose Weasley ambled along with Matt Barton from Ravenclaw. I had nothing against him, and yeah, everything against her, but that was just one awkward pair. I supposed it worked. Their levels of attractiveness balanced out and their heights were about even, so you didn't necessarily notice that she was such a giant. But personality wise, I simply didn't see it.

"Oh Merlin, who put the two of them together?" Emmett wondered.

"I think that'd be Barton, by the look of things," Andi murmured. "He looks at her like he wants her. His hand is free and open, waiting to hold hers, but she keeps her hands firmly tucked away. Notice how every time he moves so much as an inch towards her, she moves away twice as much? The poor boy."

"It doesn't mesh in my head," Emmett said. "He's too… and she's too… and I feel like she could be but she's not."

"That didn't make any sense," I informed him. But in many ways, he was right. Barton was too romancy and kind and Rose Weasley was too uptight and innately evil. She could be sweet, but she wasn't. I laughed internally for a moment, thinking of my evil plan. "You know, I think I'm going to head into Zonko's."

"Okay," Andi said. "If you want us, we'll be at the Three Broomsticks." I shuddered a little bit, thinking about what that might entail. I had visions of the two of them snogging sloppily over butterbeer. I didn't really need to join that.

Zonko's was, of course, owned by one of the thousands of Weasleys that seemed to populate this planet. One of Rose's Uncles, Fred Weasley's dad, had purchased it right after the war and extended his Diagon Alley chain of Weasley's Wizard Wheezes. In my opinion, it was without a doubt the best joke merchandise ever created. Of course, since it was Hogsmeade weekend and Fred Weasley was still at Hogwarts, I didn't doubt that there would be at least one or two Weasley relatives hanging out in the shop. Still, I could always stand to get a fairly steady supply of joke products and more.

The best part of the Weasley's Wizard Wheezes was the fact that they did not discriminate based on old family prejudices. A customer was a customer, whether he was a Malfoy or not. The first time I purchased anything from the Diagon Alley that could get me into trouble, right before my first year, I remembered George Weasley looking down at me. He said, "Just so you know, WWW takes no responsibility for any sort of punishment you incur after using our products." I only looked up at him and said, "Don't worry. I'll just make sure I do enough to get your products banned so that everyone will want them."

"Hey, Malfoy," he said to me kindly when I came in. He didn't spend time in the Hogsmeade branch unless it was a Hogsmeade weekend and he could see Fred, but he still knew me by name. I supposed I probably paid for several dinners on the Weasley table in my time as a paying customer, and so George Weasley was pretty good to me, old family prejudices aside.

"Have anything new and interesting in?" I wondered.

"Why don't we chat in the back," he suggested, gesturing to a purple curtain that blocked the back room off from the main part of the store. I followed him around the counter to the back where shelves upon shelves held merchandise and boxes with complex labels.

I found my eyes distracted by a box labeled "Kiss Mist" sitting on top of a bigger box with the words "Bat Bogey Bottle."

"So. Fred told me you're Head Boy. It amazes me that you've managed that after all the trouble-causing merchandise you've bought in the past seven years."

"I don't get caught," I said.

George Weasley nodded at me. "Well, okay. I figure we should do our transactions more under the table to prevent your impeachment. All of the good stuff is back here, of course. Nothing I want to sell to just anybody."

"What's kiss mist?" I questioned, pointing at the box.

"It's a general chaos causer of sorts. It provides temporary infatuation for a large crowd of people… depending on the size of the bottle, anywhere between a classroom of kids or the Great Hall. Prices vary accordingly of course. Just pull the tab on the bottle and the mist releases into the air. It causes anyone who breathes in a drop to fall victim to an irresistible compulsion to kiss every member of the opposite sex in their sight. The general idea is that it provides a distraction for any other sort of mischief. No stink bombs, no powder, no risk other than kissing someone you shouldn't. Each bottle includes an antidote for the caster. You can purchase more antidotes if you think someone else will be involved in your mischief."

I thought about that for a moment. "I'll take two bottles. One for a classroom size and one for the Great Hall size. And I want… five people's worth of antidotes."

"I should warn you that it isn't necessarily one hundred percent effective on people who may be in an extremely devoted relationship. It is very hard to get it to work on married people—and if it works, it means that that marriage isn't really a happy one."

"That's alright, I'll be fine," Scorpius said. "What else do you have? I need to stock up for the school year."

-CD-

Rose:

"What do you need prank stuff for?" Matt asked me as I drifted through the aisles of Uncle George's store.

"Stuff," I replied. Because I never revealed my secrets. I looked up as my uncle appeared from the backroom, followed by none other than Scorpius Malfoy. I raised a questioning eyebrow to myself, wondering what type of mischief Malfoy might be up to—not that it mattered as Albus and I caused our own fair share of trouble with Uncle George's products. I needed to get into that backroom myself, which I was sure Uncle George would let me.

"You're mysterious, aren't you?" Matt teased, calling back my attention. I didn't look at him. He didn't need to see my stressed out face. I wasn't sure I could handle much more of him. He was just too sweet. Sweet in a way that I would like if he was my boyfriend, but I hated it because he was simply not my type. I just didn't know what to say to him. And it would have been much appreciated if he wanted to stop trying to hold my hand every three seconds.

Well, he wasn't so much trying as he was hinting. He would _accidentally _brush his hand against mine when we were walking, so I had to keep stepping away to get my point across. He didn't seem to be getting the hint though, honestly. I didn't want to break his heart. I just wanted him to realize that we weren't going to happen on his own!

Though I supposed if I wanted to actually achieve that item on my list "find a boyfriend if time" I had the perfect opportunity in front of me. Except, when I looked at Matt Barton, I did _not _think boyfriend. Instead, I thought he would be a good person to be partners with in Herbology…

"Hey, Rosie," Uncle George said, greeting me with a wave and a smile. "Have you seen Freddie at all?"

"He's on a date," I said, waggling my eyebrows. "I'm sure he'll be here in a little bit though."

"A date huh? Well, he probably won't show up at all then. Are you going to introduce me to your friend?"

"This is Matt," I practically grunted, waving a hand at Matt. Malfoy snorted under his breath. I glared at him. "Do you have a problem?"

"Oh no, not at all," Scorpius said. "Go on your merry way, _Rosie, _I'll just settle my debt with your uncle."  
>"Can I go in the back?" I asked Uncle George, looking over my shoulder at Matt who didn't seem to be part of the conversation as he was too busy examining a selection of different muggle card tricks. When I looked at him I often wanted to yawn.<p>

"Yeah, go ahead. Pick out what you want," Uncle George said. I stalked past Malfoy and behind the counter, ducking under the curtain.

I glared at all of the boxes on the walls. Albus would probably come in shortly—if he wasn't too busy snogging Anna in a quiet corner of the Three Broomsticks—and stock up as well, but we needed to gather supplies to cause some under cover mischief—the type we were best at, inherited from his father and mine. I didn't want to get in trouble, so Albus always took the fall. The professors seemed to know I was involved, but they could never prove it and they never really tried.

A little bit of me wanted to have a temper tantrum in the backroom. I wanted Matt Barton to go pant after some other girl and I wanted all of my friends to not be dating each other or random people so I didn't feel like that awkward singleton stuck with a book while everyone else was happily taken and snogging away in the corner.

Maybe I was a little bit uptight, but it was hard to not be, with someone like Matt. I didn't want him to touch me, so he didn't. If I wanted someone to touch me I always imagined that I would be totally cavalier and just… let them.

I grumbled and started grabbing what I wanted, stacking it precariously into my arms before stomping back out of the backroom and dumping it on the counter. Uncle George looked up at me and smiled. He stood next to Matt, showing him some of the intricacies of his products. Malfoy was gone.

"Find everything alright?" he asked with a wink.

"I'm good," I said. "What do you I owe you?"

He came back around the corner and added up my purchases, taking off the usual discount he awarded to all friends and family—even my dad. I slid some gold across the counter and he put all of my purchases into a box for me to make it easier to carry. I looked at the load and thought for a moment.

"I don't know if you're going to want to carry this around all day, it's kind of hefty and awkward," he said.

"I could just take it back up to the castle now…" I said. I loved Uncle George. He always knew just how to give me an escape.

"Can you leave it here, maybe?" Matt asked hopefully.  
>I watched my uncle obviously sigh. His look told me that he tried and I hoped mine told him that I thanked him for it.<p>

"Alright, I'll come get it at the end of the day," I said. "Thanks Uncle George."

"You're welcome Rosie. Send Freddie this way if you see him," he said.

"Will do," I said, stuffing my hands into my jacket pocket to keep them out of the way of Matt, who stood there, holding the door open for me. I stalked out into the cold.

"Do you want to head to the Three Broomsticks?" Matt wondered.

"Sure, I could use some butterbeer," I said, ducking my head against the wind.

"Alrighty," Matt said. _Alrighty. _Was that actually acceptable for any male to say?

"Matt…" I said.

"You're not having a good time, are you?" he wondered.

"I don't know," I said. "I don't what I'm doing."  
>"Rose, I really like you," he said, grabbing my arm. "What… what am I doing wrong?"<p>

"You're not doing anything wrong," I said. "I don't know what's wrong with me. In a perfect world I would feel exactly the same way that you do. You're smart, attractive, kind… But I don't return your feelings. I am uptight, I am high strung, I am everything that makes this impossible. But I don't want to hurt you, so I said yes, hoping a date would loosen me up a little. When in reality it just made things worse. I'm sorry. I'm so sorry."

"Rose… do you fancy Malfoy?" he asked.

"What… what? No!" I practically shouted. My voice got lost in the wind that steadily froze my nose into a numb ice cube on the front of my face. "I don't think there's anyone on this earth that I could possibly hate as much as I hate him."

"That's a lie," Matt said. "You really don't hate him, do you?"

"I… There's no fancying. I see him as a rival and an equal but not romantically," I declared.

"Yeah. Okay. Tell that to everyone else," Matt said. He cracked a smile. "Look, I think you and I could be friends, you know. Maybe?"

"I think so," I said. "I'd like to think so…"

He smiled at me. "Great minds can cause a lot of trouble you know."

"I love trouble. But don't tell anyone that. I am the head girl, after all," I said, smiling at him. "Let's go see who we can run into in the Three Broomsticks shall we? I think my nose is going to fall off if we stand out in the cold any longer."


End file.
